Mexico, May 15 (Notimex) .- Researchers from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM, for its acronym in Spanish) develop a targeted therapy to eliminate up to 80 percent of cervical cancer cells.

In an interview with Notimex, Rosalva Rangel Corona, project leader of the Faculty of Higher Studies, Zaragoza, explained that this protein helps to reduce the size of the tumor by causing suicide (apoptosis) of malignant cells, by stimulating the immune system.

Cervical cancer is the second cause of death in women due to malignant tumors, being human papillomavirus (HPV) in subtypes 16 and 18 being one of the main precursors of the disease. As it occurs in most neoplasms, it is diagnosed in advanced stages.

The study carried out in mice showed that the treatment is effective both early and advanced stages of the disease because even one of the lines of research is in metastatic cancer.

"We have worked in mice and the result is that in five days the tumor mass is reduced 80 percent, now we have to start a preclinical study in women to demonstrate the effectiveness of the treatment," she said.

Rangel Corona explained that 20 years ago work is being done on this project, four years ago the patent was obtained to protect the research, and she estimated that at least five more years will pass to have conclusive results in human beings.

Partnerships were made with other institutions to find the best vehicle that carries the protein to the tumor cells and define the presentation of the medicament so that a pharmaceutical company can buy the patent and market it.